


Compartmentalization as a Survival Mechanism

by DepressedDaisy



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Addiction, Autistic Spencer Reid, But it's only hinted at, Character Study, Gen, Illness, Just like in canon, Mostly Canon Compliant, Trauma, mentions of Maeve Donovan/Spencer Reid, mentions of Maxine "Max" Brenner/Spencer Reid, mentions of other BAU team members, mentions of pretty much everyone that's had an impact on Reid's life but always briefly, mentions of various unsubs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-16 10:53:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29206170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DepressedDaisy/pseuds/DepressedDaisy
Summary: Dr. Spencer Reid has been through a lot in his life and career as an FBI agent. But he makes it through in his own way.
Kudos: 5





	Compartmentalization as a Survival Mechanism

People often talked about Spencer Reid's "big brain" as way to compliment his smarts. Of course, he knew it made no sense, as the size of the brain has nothing to do with intelligence, nor is his brain any larger than usual, but he'd stopped correcting people a long time ago, and just let them have their metaphors. But he supposed there was some truth to that, if only psychological. His brain could be considered big, for all the nooks and crannies, corners and boxes he kept digging out, to keep it from getting too crowded, to be able to focus on what he needed to focus in order to not get lost in the mess. Once, Rossi had asked him "How do you keep all those facts and figures straight in that head of yours?" And sure, organization helps, but that's not the mess that occupies his mind. Reid usually has no trouble with his eidetic memory, but it's his own thoughts that constantly find new ways to plague him. So, the only way to not think about some things, so that he can focus on a case, or a book, or a team member in need, is to put them in a box. Really, it's a survival instinct.

Sometimes these boxes almost get forgotten, shoved so far deep in his mind they just gather dust until maybe something shakes them up. Like his first box ever, his father leaving. Spencer managed to not think about it so much that he almost completely forgot about him. Or so much more about his childhood, things he liked to pretend didn't exist. Like all the different ways he was mocked and humiliated throughout his school years. Or how guidance counselors kept wanting to meet with him, because “There's just something about your son, Mrs. Reid. We have some tests, and it might be for his best”, but his mom never let him go, convinced it was some government ploy to get them.

Others are constantly trying to peer into his consciousness, and he has to fight like his life depends on it not to let it into his mind. In the months after Tobias Hankel, he had to learn to forcefully make one of these boxes. At first, it was impossible to keep it away from his mind, it hanged off his every thought, but he was eventually able to pack it up, along with those little flasks and needles, and shove it away. He didn't put away what he could use, the experience that allowed him to better understand their victims and their cases, but the trauma and the addiction? There was no use for them. As soon as he was able to, he pushed them away, and even if the box came back to bother him, when something so bad happened that it'd be easy to be swayed by its dull current of "Forget, just forget, just give in and it'll be so much easier", Spencer knew he could fight it and shut that up. Another box also formed all on its own, even without his intent. For all he never wanted to forget anything about Maeve, even the soul crushing grief and guilt and heartbreak he'd felt upon her death, in time, it too fell to the outskirts of his mind. Sometimes, the box would get shaken up, and he'd feel guilty over its existence, but deep down he knew he had to keep it away, and he had to keep it closed, or the grief would consume him once more, if he ever let himself truly think about it.

Some boxes are neatly squared away, simply having no use thinking about them, or at least not enjoying it. He tried not to, but often his former teammates fell into this box. In whatever circumstances, be it Gideon's insistence on staying off the grid, not to mention later death, or Hotch's impossibility for contact, or just the work (and more) getting in the way of visiting Morgan, Reid often forgot to check in on them as much as the coworkers he saw every day, and, before he realized it, a week, a month, a year had gone by. He didn't really mean to, but it was, in a way, easier to imagine them riding off into the sunset, finally happy and unbothered, than to call and check and possibly find something horrible had happened. One other box he supposed fell into this category, though it was opened more often than the others, really only because she kept showing up, poking and prodding at its walls, was the one he had hastily and forcefully made for all things Cat Adams. The former hit woman got deeper under his skin than he cared to admit, more than any other unsub. Not only was she somehow able to always see through him (not enough that he couldn't lie to her, she had a pretty big blind spot when it came to him - but enough that she could tell he was lying and choose whether or not to care), but she reminded him of the worst parts of himself, in her twisted insistence that they deserved each other, and he hated her, he really did. But, at the same time, he couldn't help but get suckered into her games every time she called for him. Cat was like a riddle he had to keep solving, and even if he didn't want to, he had to admit, it was a pretty damn good puzzle. But that was exactly why she was dangerous and had to be locked away. Her intellect and wickedness attracted him just enough to make Spencer want to beat her at all costs, maybe even enough for him to lose himself. So, even if she got the death penalty, even if Spencer saw them inject her with the bloody needle with his own eyes, he feared that what Cat represented, the mind games she'd played with him, would always leave a mark. It was really for the best if he never thought about her.

Some boxes haunt him, hanging at the edges of his mind, not open, but always taunting him, like reminders of his failures. Sometimes he can shut them up, sometimes he can't. Like his mother, and her sickness, which he kept pushing away for way too long, not calling enough, not writing as many letters as he could, and not visiting nearly as much as he should. He wanted to be there for his mother, he really did – even if he didn’t really knew how to – but if he opened that box, not only would the situation present itself before him, but all his fears as well. That what expected him when he looked back was actually his future. That he would have to stand by, helpless, as his mom continued to slip away from him until she was gone. The box continued to nag at him, though, and maybe it was for the best, because while it mostly whispered “this is where you’ll end up” and “you’re not doing enough”, it also said “you should go, you can’t forget about her”. It was a box that had been easier to ignore in the past, when his mom had been somewhat stable, and he could be sure she was getting the best care possible, even if away from him, but things got a lot more complicated when she got her second diagnosis. Alzheimer’s meant he couldn’t just sit and wait and go see her when he could, anymore. It meant every second they could spent together was accounted for. Suddenly, there was a ticking clock, and though his anxieties were still there – maybe even doubled, now – Spencer had to take his mom from her box and make her a priority. It complicated his life in more ways than he could have predicted (needing to take time off to go look into new facilities and treatments for her; having her move in with him and taking care of her; searching for new, experimental medicine, no matter the cost, even if it turned out to be pretty high) but it was worth it. Because for every fear he had, every bad episode she suffered, everything he had to go through in his searches, it was worth it for seeing her smile in a good day, and reminisce about his childhood, or making new memories, the two of them. But there were also other boxes that haunted him, and not all of them had that much good with the bad. These were the taunts that seeped out into his unconscious, the nightmares and even the darker thoughts he couldn’t help after every mistake, every questionable decision. The aftermath of everything he’d been through, from every hostage situation, every abduction, every life he couldn’t save, all the bodies they encountered on a daily basis, to the horrors he’d witnessed, and, even worse, participated in. What he’d seen and done while he was in prison continued to play in the back of his mind, and though he always, constantly, tried to keep it away, he couldn’t pretend it hadn’t changed him. It had definitely changed how he saw himself, the lines he thought he wouldn’t cross but actually could, but not just that. It’d changed his behavior, from his PTSS, to simple, everyday stuff. Hell, his shooting had improved, just because he now felt the true weight of it, and knew how dangerous and how valuable it could be. He could push it away all he’d like, but it kept nagging at him in the nights or in the aftermath of a case gone south. It could be torture, but he was learning how to turn these experiences into incentives. How to turn his experiences into empathy and knowledge. How to defy his darkest thoughts and be determined to prove them wrong, every day, by doing good.

Spencer had found that the boxes served their purposes in the day to day, and it was good to be able to not be constantly worried about something else when the team was in the middle of a case and they needed his expertise, or a friend was hurt or in need (which happened often, in their line of work), or hunting down a serial killer, or playing with his godchildren without worrying he might be a bad influence, or even wondering “what might’ve been”, or just reading a new book, studying a new subject or teaching a class, or even simply going on a date with Max without thinking about the last time he found himself falling in love (Max didn’t need a box. Not yet at least. She was normal, and uncomplicated, and _real_. Not something that kept him from his work, but something that actually helped him deal with it. Not something that distracted him, but something he wanted to give his full attention to and that, for the first time in a while, hadn’t gone terribly wrong, despite attempts to the contrary) – the things he _wanted_ to dedicate his attention to. He realized their usefulness especially when he wasn’t able to get a box for what was bothering him, like his headaches, his lack of confidence over how he was perceived by his coworkers – too young, or too sick, or too damaged – (which was admittedly smaller than it’d been back when he was younger, fresh out in the field, but still there), the occasional unsub or victim he couldn’t stop wondering about (like Phillip Dowd, Tobias Hankel, Peter Lewis, Ryan Phillips, or Riley Jenkins), or his worry for Maeve, back when they’d first met. Spencer had found he was always more distracted and less capable during cases when something like that was bothering him. But even so, he’d been learning with how to deal with those things too, be it reaching out to his team, his family, or removing himself from cases when he knew he couldn’t deal. Despite everything else, though, now he knew that he also had to remind himself that the boxes weren’t dumpsites. He needed to shake them up, dust them off every now and again, and look inside. As much as the truth might bother or hurt him, it could be useful, and help him know himself better, and even serve as a good reminder of what he had, not just a bad one of what he had lost.

When he was younger, Spencer had wanted to keep all the facets of himself apart and easily organized. Black and white, like a chessboard. But he’d been learning the importance of seeing not just himself, but the world, as grey. It wasn’t just serial killers and despair and evil everywhere, all the time. But it also wasn’t just heroic agents constantly saving the day and keeping the bad away. Just like he wasn’t just the trauma, and the fears, and the rage. And also not just the wisdom, the badge and the heart. It was all of it. He was all of it. Maybe the boxes helped him, but maybe it was also for the best he didn’t completely shut them tight and shove them away, but keep the lids open, just a little bit…

**Author's Note:**

> Criminal Minds is awesome in a lot of ways, but not always about continuity, or, you know, letting its characters catch one goddamned break. So, I was thinking about all the crap Reid had to deal with for 15 seasons, and how rarely we got to see it actually affect him, and this is what came out.
> 
> (Btw, I also had a whole other paragraph dedicated to the big JJ reveal in Season 14, written in the effort to include every significant incident we know about from canon, but since most of us are just trying to ignore it ever happened, I decided against posting it, but if anyone is interested, let me know and I might share it!)


End file.
